A Piece of Soul
by Gaffel
Summary: At that horrible Halloween night, everything changed, but not quite the way Lord Voldemort intended. Harry Potter is not the Boy Who Lived, but that doesn't mean he is not getting into trouble...
1. Prologue

**Disclaimer: Not mine. I am not J.K. Rowling, sadly.**

**I posted this on my Wattpad account about six months ago, but I never finished the fanfic and I am never on Wattpad anymore, so I decided to move it :)**

**Warnings: Death scene. But if you are reading this and you read Harry Potter, you shouldn't be too scared by this...**

* * *

The man in the cloak drew closer to the house. He saw the man and the woman through the window, both watching their little son play with a tiny broomstick. There was a soft breeze and some autumn leaves were whirling around his feet. The wizard felt the same energy as he always felt when he was about to do what he liked the most. To kill.

When he got at the door, he rang the doorbell. He had to be polite, after all. He saw a big, furry cat run away from the corner of his eye, but he did not pay attention to it. When the door did not open, he blew it away with a simple wave of his wand. He heard the father yell at his wife. "Take Harry and leave, Lily! I'll try to stop him as long as I can! _Do it!_"

She apparently stayed, because all three members of the family were in the living room when he got there. The red-haired woman had her wand raised, just like the man. He did not care. Wands could not harm the Dark Lord.

Voldemort instantly turned to the little boy instead, who was resting in his mother's arms. He did not yet know what fate lay ahead of him. But then the thing happened that would changed the lives of all the people in the room for good.

The Dark Lord raised his wand with the familiar gesture and said the even more familiar words.

"_Avada Kedavra!" _

But something went wrong. The father pushed his wife behind his back as the Dark Lord raised his wand, and the spell that he casted would kill James Potter instantly.

The messy-haired man dropped to the ground and lay there motionless, with a look of determination and bravery still on his face, while Lily Potter let out a shriek of pain when she saw her husband die.

Voldemort felt a macabre sort of joy when the mother screamed and started pleading. "Not Harry, please, not Harry _too_!"

Voldemort simply turned towards the boy again and yelled the Killing Curse for the second time, but this time it didn't go right. Not right at all.

There was a sensation of being ripped apart, he wanted to scream because of the utter pain but he couldn't and then he was nothing, yet he still _was_.

And he could still see Lily Potter and her son, who lay unharmed in his mother's arms, while Lily suffered an indescribable pain on the place where the killing curse had hit her. And not by the killing curse alone. Tears were streaming down her face when she put her hand on her dead husband's face and closed his staring eyes. But she lived. And the boy did too.

The Dark Lord saw this all, but couldn't do anything. He didn't know what he was - was he dead? No, that couldn't be. His horcruxes prevented that from happening. That must've been it. The horcruxes. Then he just left. He found that he could go wherever he wanted, like a ghost without a body.

He would get his chance. When he could, he would kill this woman and her son.

People started to arrive. One young man with black hair arrived on a motorbike. A man with a large, silvery beard. Several ministry people and aurors. Then it became very quiet, but while Lily Potter cried over her husband, the ministry sent out the message that it was safe again. Everywhere in the country and beyond, people were celebrating. Voldemort was dead, the evil gone.

But they couldn't have been more wrong.


	2. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: nope, I'm still not J.K. Rowling.**

**Warnings: none, I think.**

**Author's Note: I promise I'll stop making Starkid references after this chapter. Okay, maybe I won't.**

It was the last day of the summer holidays, and Harry was packing his trunk to go back to Hogwarts. As he packed his brand new schoolbooks, he whistled a song and slowly gathered all the things.

His room was a complete mess, and his mother had asked him several times to clean it, but he had not done it until it was absolutely necessary. He finally closed his trunk and walked downstairs. He left the trunk in the little hall and went to the kitchen to help his mother with cooking. She had put extra effort into it, because it was the last night that Harry and his younger brother James were home, before they went to Hogwarts. She smiled at him as he took a knife and started cutting carrots.

Harry liked to watch her cook, with her delicate movements as she scaled the ingredients and her face that was frowning ever so slightly. It was the same look she had as when she was brewing potions. As a potions mistress, her task was to be precise, or things could go very wrong. Harry knew this all too well, because he himself had had three years of potions at school, and he was completely rubbish at it.

"I'm going to miss you, sweetheart," his mother said, turning towards him. "Now I don't even have James here, of course. He is so excited for his first year!" she said proudly. Then she suddenly frowned. "Oh dear, I forgot to invite Sirius for tonight! How could I have forgotten? Harry, dear, can you please send an owl to him quickly? He will be able to come here anyway if he's got nothing to do tonight." Harry nodded and went to the living room where their snowy owl sat in its cage. He quickly wrote a note.

_Dear Sirius,_

_Mom forgot to invite you, but tonight we are celebrating that James and I are going to Hogwarts tomorrow. If you have time, you can come over and have dinner with us. Hope to see you soon,_

_Harry_

He gave it to the excited owl and it took off, flying with its beautiful wings out of sight. He then went back to the kitchen, but when his mother did not need him he went upstairs to help James with packing his trunk.

Upstairs there were four rooms: the first one on the left was Harry's and the second was the bathroom. Then there were two rooms on the right side. The first was his mother's room. It used to be Harry's, but Lily couldn't bear sleeping in the same room as she always slept in with her husband, before he died. So when her nightmares only became worse and worse, Harry had volunteerd to swap rooms with her. After that, Harry would be woken up only occasionally by the screams of his mother.

Then the second room on the right was the chamber where Harry and James had put all their toys and played when they were younger, but when they grew up, the chamber had become a room for visitors who stayed overnight. It was often occupied by Sirius and sometimes by Ron Weasley, Harry's best friend at Hogwarts.

Ron lived in a house with his parents, little sister, three brothers and sometimes even a fourth or fifth brother came to visit, so it was always very busy and Ron liked the quiet house that Harry lived in. They usually sat in Harry's room, talking and eating Bertie Bott's Every Flavoured Beans, or they were outside playing Quidditch. This summer he and Ron had gone to the Quidditch World Cup, together with Ron's family and it had been one of the best days ever.

Anyway, Harry knocked on his brother's door and pushed it open. James was on the ground, surrounded by books, clothes, potion ingredients and all sort of things he would need for Hogwarts.

James was a younger version of Harry. They both had their father's dark, messy hair that would never stay in the same place for more than five minutes. Both boys were skinny and short. They shared their father's bad eyesight, so they were wearing glasses. But the most striking thing about their appearance was their eyes. Harry and James were used to hearing it, but they had their mother's eyes. Bright green they were, like emeralds.

James looked upset, and he angrily threw a book away. "It doesn't fit. It doesn't fit in my trunk," he groaned. "I have too much things I have to take with me!" Indeed, the trunk was already full, although there was a lot of stuff still on the bedroom floor.

Harry grinned at him and said: "All right, let's unpack this first. There must be loads of stuff you don't really need at Hogwarts in there."

Harry was right. James appeared to have packed several books he wouldn't need, five blankets and even a whole assortment of things he had gotten out of Christmas sweets, toys, Chocolate Frog cards and a lot more.

"You won't need any of these," Harry said gesturing towards the blankets. "The House Elves at Hogwarts will take care of your blankets. And as for the books, you will be able to get all the books you want in the library, there is no need to carry them all with you. Only the books on your list are absolutely necessary."

James, relieved, thanked Harry and together they sorted out all the things James wouldn't need and when they were finally done, they were getting quite hungry and went to look downstairs if dinner was almost ready. They found Sirius sitting on the couch. He grinned broadly before getting up to pull them into a hug.

"Hello, boys," he said, as he sat back down. "Long time no see!"

"Yeah, definitely. You saw us three days ago, that is such a long time," Harry replied, but on the inside he was very happy that Padfoot said this.

They were very close, closer than Sirius and James would ever be. Harry knew that James was too much like their father, and that Sirius still missed his best friend every day. All his old Hogwarts friends were dead or in the wizarding prison, Azkaban. Of course, Harry _looked_ like his father, but James also _acted _like him. Immature, wild and a love for trouble. Harry, on the other hand, was quieter, and even though he didn't always follow the rules either, he was not a troublemaker like James.

"Harry, you know I love you so much that I wouldn't want to live 3 seconds without you, my love," Sirius said with a grin.

"Yikes," James said.

After dinner Sirius took Harry apart. "You'll write, won't you?"

Harry grinned. "Of course I will, as always."

* * *

"Boys, hurry up!" It was about the seventh time that Lily had called her sons, and it was getting really late. But of course they had to pack extra stuff, and of course they had to say goodbye to the owl and the cat and the rat and everything took so long that even the normally quite calm Lily was getting stressed. "BOYS, NOW!"

They came rushing out of the house - because angry mum was a scary mum - dragging their heavy trunks behind them. Harry felt excitement, but it was nothing in comparison with James. The younger boy almost literally exploded with enthusiasm. He was jumping up and down with a huge grin on his face.

The taxi driver looked at them, amused. "You've got everything, haven't ye?" he asked them, turning the keys of the taxi.

The motor growled and the car shook. James looked at it in amazement. They barely ever travelled by car. Harry saw his younger brother's reaction and whispered in his ear: "You better act like this is the most normal thing ever, or he might be suspicious." James looked ashamed by his mistake and got in the car after Harry and Lily.

James made another mistake instantly. While the car drove out of the street, he asked Harry how long the journey to Hogwarts was, forgetting again in his excitement that Muggles didn't ought to know about it. The taxi driver looked in his mirror at James, eyebrows raised. "What's Hogwarts? A zoo? Good place for a pair of monkeys like you!" He laughed loudly at his own joke, almost driving into another car when he didn't pay attention.

"Ha-ha-ha," Harry said sarcastically. "No, it isn't. It's a school." James looked wide-eyed at him. He couldn't believe that Harry was actually telling the driver! Harry winked at him. Then he continued: "Yeah, it's a school for wizards and witches and we learn to do magic and turn people into frogs and brew potions and use spells. It's totally awesome."

The driver chuckled. "I like you, lad. You're a funny one, you are." And he dropped the subject after he decided he didn't care what the bloody Hogfarts was anyway.

After an hour or so, the traffic was getting busier and when they got at King's Cross station at last, they had only fifteen minutes left. The driver lighted a cigarette.

"Well, good luck at your bloody Pigfarts or whatever it's called."

They greeted him politely and the three of them walked away with the two trunks. Lily had stayed abnormally silent, Harry was sure it was because they both went to school now and she had to be alone. He very much hoped that Sirius would come to visit her a lot and that there were a lot of potions to brew, when Harry and James were at Hogwarts for almost the entire year.

"Pigfarts, have you ever heard such a stupid thing?" James was chatting and laughing happily, he didn't even wait at the barrier between platform 9 and 10, he ran straight through it without hesitating. Harry grinned and went after his mother and brother.

* * *

"Harry! There you are!"

"We looked for you everywhere!"

"We thought you had missed the train, but-"

Ron stopped talking when Harry pulled him into a hug. Fred and George stood behind him, perfect copies of each other and identicle to the last freckle.

"Fancy a hug of us two too, Harry?" Fred said. Harry grinned. "Nope, that privilege is only reserved for my best friend and my brother." That was when the three Weasley brothers noticed James, who sat in the far corner of the compartment.

"Hello James!" Ron said. "Good to see you again! Fred, George, this is Harry's little brother, James."

The twins beamed at him, looking pleased. "A mini Harry," Fred said.

"Or Harry is a mega James. I'm Forge by the way, and this is Gred," George said.

They spent the rest of the day talking and eating all sorts of sweets. They had a great time working away the large pile Harry and James had stuffed into their trunks; they'd saved their pocket money to buy them in Diagon Alley, where everything was much cheaper than on the Hogwarts Express.

When the candy lady passed with the trolley, they didn't give it a single glance: they were too preoccupied by the Bertie Bott's Every Flavored Beans that James had brought. Harry got one that tasted like pepper, George had a paper flavored one, Fred wasn't sure about the taste but he thought it was soap, Ron smacked his lips when he ate a strawberry-flavored one ("the last time I actually had one that tasted good was ages ago") and Harry also was lucky: he had chocolate. Only James was very unlucky: he swore he got a bogie flavoured one. He quickly took a pumpkin pasty and didn't touch the beans again.

After a few hours, the Weasley's younger sister Ginny burst into the compartment. "Guys, guys, great news! I'm glad I finally found you! I overheard some Slytherins, and guess what they were talking about?" She didn't pause to give them time to answer. "There is some kind of tournament held this year! With tasks and there are coming students from other schools and I even heard something about dragons and all sort of creatures and I'm so excited!" She said this all very fast.

The boys looked at each other for a second, digesting what she'd said. Then they loudly started discussing everything.

"Whadduyathink?" Ron said with his mouth full of Pumpkin Pasty. Ginny sat down, looking disgusted at him. "Awreyougonnaentew?" Ron asked (at least, Harry assumed it was a question). Harry raised an eyebrow. "I'm sorry, I didn't quite catch that." Ginny snorted at his comment. Ron swallowed agitatedly. He angrily glanced at Ginny before repeating in normal English what he'd just said.

"What. Do. You. Think? Are. You. Going. To. Enter?" This time he said everything very slow and clearly, obviously irritated. Harry sighed. "I'm not sure... I'm not exceptionally good at magic anyway. I mean, I'm not like some people in our year. And there are loads of other students who are much older and better at stuff like this."

As he said it, he was entirely convinced that he did not want to enter if he could. Ron could not understand it.

"Harry, really? Where is your sense for adventure? This could be a great opportunity to get points and recognition!" But Harry shrugged. "I really don't care about recognition," he told him. "And besides, I got enough of it with all this 'the woman who lived'-stuff. I mean, people expected great things from me, because my mother sort of defeated You-Know-Who. And well, I survived too. The attention I got really bothered me, so it's a big no from me."

Ron sunk deep into his seat, very disappointed. Ginny poked her brother with her feet and said that at least he could try to enter.

"Are you going to enter, Ginevra?" Ron mumbled, before he was hit in the stomach by a furious Ginny.

"Don't. Call. Me. Ginevra!"  
Suddenly, she noticed James sitting in the compartment, looking like he wanted to be invisible.

"Hey! A mini Harry!"

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**Continue? :)**


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